Talking point terminology woven into the fabric of a fallacious argument followed by the argument that rich Frenchmen should take their ball and go home to Mississippi...pure pathological partisanship.

FTFA:France's neighbors have adopted different strategies to try to regain economic growth and return the costs of government services to sustainable levels. They have avoided large tax increases.

France's neighbors are doing fine except for Spain. Its the small Mediterranean countries with a much more minimal welfare state that are suffering (as well as Ireland and Spain, which also have a minimal welfare state.) Sweden, Denmark and Germany with their high taxes and large welfare states, are doing just fine. Quit lying.

Yeah, leave that place where your taxes go to decent government services to a place where you'll pay less, get a lot less, and also have to deal with Republicans. Mississippi Republicans. Mississippi Republicans in Mississippi. With a French Accent.

"Several U.S. states were reportedly prepared to offer more than double that amount of subsidy. But Fedchun said much of that extra money would have been eaten away by higher training costs than are necessary for the Woodstock project.

He said Nissan and Honda have encountered difficulties getting new plants up to full production in recent years in Mississippi and Alabama due to an untrained - and often illiterate - workforce. In Alabama, trainers had to use "pictorials" to teach some illiterate workers how to use high-tech plant equipment."

If you don't have the civic fortitude to put up with taxes that are levied against the rich, then you really need to get the fark out of your country and move somewhere that doesn't put such a terrible burden on you. But you should be tarred and feathered on your way out of the country.

Taking care of your fellow citizens is important, and taking care of the poor is good. Acting selfishly and running away from these responsibilities is disgusting and cowardly. So go to Mississippi, you French farks. Enjoy your hellhole of a state once you arrive.

Somacandra:France's neighbors are doing fine except for Spain. Its the small Mediterranean countries with a much more minimal welfare state that are suffering (as well as Ireland and Spain, which also have a minimal welfare state.) Sweden, Denmark and Germany with their high taxes and large welfare states, are doing just fine. Quit lying.

Indeed. Switzerland's economy is also excellent. With the Euro tanking around it, the Swiss Franc is quite strong and the Swiss National Bank has to take measures to weaken the Franc to discourage people from seeking it as a safe reserve currency (as a really strong Franc makes exports more expensive, lessens tourism, etc.).

Swiss taxes are not exactly low, and they have both income taxes and property taxes (which are applied annually not just to real estate, but to the net worth of people: stocks, bonds, mutual funds, etc. are all subject to property tax). There's also the VAT (~8%) on all sales of goods or services, a 35% tax roughly equivalent to the US capital gains tax, and so on. Cost of living is also high, but the quality of life is excellent.

Switzerland has a national, integrated rail system, excellent public transport in cities, a modern electrical grid powered mostly by hydro and some nuclear, essentially no crime, low pollution, a highly-educated population, etc. France is not too different in most respects. Mississippi can barely keep the roads paved, bridges standing, and generally seems to be populated by morons of the highest order.

If I were a French brazillionaire and given the choice between "stay in France, where my friends, family, business partners, etc. are located and pay somewhat increased taxes on a fraction of my gigantic wealth" and "move to Mississippi and pay lower taxes", the choice would be pretty obvious.

This whole discussion kinda tiptoes around the obvious.... if you've got that much money, you can afford to move wherever you want. Is the difference between Switzerland, Germany, and France, so stark that you'd pay a hundred thousand extra a year to live in France over either of the others?

Mrbogey:This whole discussion kinda tiptoes around the obvious.... if you've got that much money, you can afford to move wherever you want. Is the difference between Switzerland, Germany, and France, so stark that you'd pay a hundred thousand extra a year to live in France over either of the others?

Is Haley Barbour secretly working for Hollande, because I can't think of a better way to make French millionaires and billionaires rethink their decision to leave. Sorry, but standard of living in France broadly exceeds the standard of living in the majority of the U.S.

Mrbogey:This whole discussion kinda tiptoes around the obvious.... if you've got that much money, you can afford to move wherever you want. Is the difference between Switzerland, Germany, and France, so stark that you'd pay a hundred thousand extra a year to live in France over either of the others?

I dunno. The French love living in their own country. It's not a place with huge mobility or that large of an expat population who leave to go live elsewhere. But of course, there is always that small number of the transnational capitalist class (like that Facebook investor that just dropped his U.S. citizenship for Singapore) who don't have any particular allegiance to any country and will gladly leave. I think they're mostly bluffing, though.

coco ebert:Sorry, but standard of living in France broadly exceeds the standard of living in the majority of the U.S.

The standard of living in France is comparable to the US. I mean, sure if you moved from the highest standard of living in France to the lowest in the US you'll see a big difference (like most of Mississippi). But do you think that someone who moves from the upper levels of French society won't find a nice place with a good standard in the US? Just about every US state has at least some area that shines. Hell, I could even name some places in Mississippi that have good schools, good jobs within a short travel, and low crime with a good standard of living if you've got the cash and job skills to buy into it.

Mrbogey:coco ebert: Sorry, but standard of living in France broadly exceeds the standard of living in the majority of the U.S.

The standard of living in France is comparable to the US. I mean, sure if you moved from the highest standard of living in France to the lowest in the US you'll see a big difference (like most of Mississippi). But do you think that someone who moves from the upper levels of French society won't find a nice place with a good standard in the US? Just about every US state has at least some area that shines. Hell, I could even name some places in Mississippi that have good schools, good jobs within a short travel, and low crime with a good standard of living if you've got the cash and job skills to buy into it.

That's why I used the term "broadly". Of course rich folk can find themselves a suitable place in any country. However, I know French people and European culture and they have different standards for what constitutes the good life from the U.S. That said, I can't speak for the West Coast or much of the flyover states but having traveled up and down the East Coast numerous times and throughout France and being a social scientist studying the United States, I just think infrastructure and public transport, food culture (I'm talking about healthiness levels, not flavor), work life (including working conditions, paid vacations, maternity leave, and sick leave), the health care system, environmental awareness, levels of violence, imprisonment, and militarization of everyday life- all of these factors broadly are better in France than the U.S. imho.

coco ebert:Mrbogey: coco ebert: Sorry, but standard of living in France broadly exceeds the standard of living in the majority of the U.S.

The standard of living in France is comparable to the US. I mean, sure if you moved from the highest standard of living in France to the lowest in the US you'll see a big difference (like most of Mississippi). But do you think that someone who moves from the upper levels of French society won't find a nice place with a good standard in the US? Just about every US state has at least some area that shines. Hell, I could even name some places in Mississippi that have good schools, good jobs within a short travel, and low crime with a good standard of living if you've got the cash and job skills to buy into it.

That's why I used the term "broadly". Of course rich folk can find themselves a suitable place in any country. However, I know French people and European culture and they have different standards for what constitutes the good life from the U.S. That said, I can't speak for the West Coast or much of the flyover states but having traveled up and down the East Coast numerous times and throughout France and being a social scientist studying the United States, I just think infrastructure and public transport, food culture (I'm talking about healthiness levels, not flavor), work life (including working conditions, paid vacations, maternity leave, and sick leave), the health care system, environmental awareness, levels of violence, imprisonment, and militarization of everyday life- all of these factors broadly are better in France than the U.S. imho.

I just realized the term "European culture" sounds both dumb and pretentious there, I just meant the things the majority of people there value vary from the U.S., where we put more an emphasis on individual liberty and freedom and bootstrappy ethics.

heypete:Somacandra: France's neighbors are doing fine except for Spain. Its the small Mediterranean countries with a much more minimal welfare state that are suffering (as well as Ireland and Spain, which also have a minimal welfare state.) Sweden, Denmark and Germany with their high taxes and large welfare states, are doing just fine. Quit lying.

Indeed. Switzerland's economy is also excellent. With the Euro tanking around it, the Swiss Franc is quite strong and the Swiss National Bank has to take measures to weaken the Franc to discourage people from seeking it as a safe reserve currency (as a really strong Franc makes exports more expensive, lessens tourism, etc.).

Swiss taxes are not exactly low, and they have both income taxes and property taxes (which are applied annually not just to real estate, but to the net worth of people: stocks, bonds, mutual funds, etc. are all subject to property tax). There's also the VAT (~8%) on all sales of goods or services, a 35% tax roughly equivalent to the US capital gains tax, and so on. Cost of living is also high, but the quality of life is excellent.

Switzerland has a national, integrated rail system, excellent public transport in cities, a modern electrical grid powered mostly by hydro and some nuclear, essentially no crime, low pollution, a highly-educated population, etc. France is not too different in most respects. Mississippi can barely keep the roads paved, bridges standing, and generally seems to be populated by morons of the highest order.

If I were a French brazillionaire and given the choice between "stay in France, where my friends, family, business partners, etc. are located and pay somewhat increased taxes on a fraction of my gigantic wealth" and "move to Mississippi and pay lower taxes", the choice would be pretty obvious.

Mississippi? Hell, where I live in New Jersey (with some of the richest counties in the country) they can barely keep roads paved and the bridges are definitely in need of upgrade. It's not just the South.

We've funneled the wealth in this country to the upper-tier class and with income and wealth inequality comes the breakdown across the board. Hollande is in the right.

fta: You might think that the purpose of the new and higher French taxes was to significantly affect the deficit. But it wasn't. Rather, writes Michael Birnbaum of the Washington Post, who notes that the higher income tax "raises too little money to make a dent in France's funding needs," the Socialist tax plan "is more of a political symbol than an economic measure. It will help give Hollande political cover."

Barbour is being an ass. Again. Pushing the "taxing the rich is cruel and besides it doesn't really help much" meme.

That noted, watching the French reacting to austerity measures by sweeping into power a socialist who promised to soak the rich while softening the harsher aspects of various austerity programs is rather interesting. You demand austerity measures from people and they will demand that the rich also suffer a little. Naturellement.

Found this part of the WaPo link the article linked to interesting.

Parliament approved a one-off wealth tax on people whose assets total more than $1.6million, and new taxes will raise$8.7 billion this year alone.

The one percent, once every ten years wealth tax is an idea who's time is coming.